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Summary

Hey everbody,

Wanted to show you a little project I've been working on for some time - http://gcode.ws
As you might've guessed by the topic name - it's a GCode visualizer. And I guess at that point most of you are asking why the hell anyone would write another one.

Well, mainly because I haven't found a single one that would comply with my humble list of requirements. I mean, most of them allows me to.. well.. visualize GCode file and nothing else. But when I open gcode - it's not for my estetical pleasure, it's to check that there are no problems and to see effects that recent slicer configuration changes done or for any other of several reasons. And the ones I've seen so far doesn't allow me to do that stuff effectively.
So I decided to write one myself.

Feature list:
1) Visualize GCode in 2D, layer by layer
1.1) Show retracts and restarts
1.2) Show print/move/retract speeds
1.3) Display only part of layer/animate squence of layer printing
2) Analyze GCode
2.1) Print time, amount of plastic used, layer height, etc. for whole file and for single layer
2.2) Reference visualized part to GCode file (i.e. select a certain part of 2d visalization, switch to GCode view - it will highlight list of lines responsible for visualized piece)
3) Multiplatform, available online (but works offline too), works locally (doesn't upload you gcode anywhere or download anything but application itself)
4) 3D visualization (I don't know what for, it's dull and useless.. need to rewrite it to be like in repetier host)
5) And yeah, it's slow, memory hungry and only supports modern browsers like chrome and ff of latests versions (maybe safari 6 and ie10, haven't checked)
6) Totaly open source so you can use it as you like )

Update 27 Nov 2012:
Lots of bug fixes, support for DC extruders (M101/M103), order of magnitude improvement in loading time for files with lots of Z movements (like Z-lifts)

Update: spring 2013
Lots of things have changes. You can now use color differentiation based on flow rate, not speed. You can enable "extrusion width" emulation to see how well your infill should look. There is a highly experimental feature "error analysis" that is available at http://gcode.ws/?new
And it's migrated to another domain long time ago =)

Instructions

Current state it somewhat stable, at least I use it myself all the time. Easiest way to use it - just go to http://gcode.ws
Alternatively - you can download a snapshot of sources from attachment or go to https://github.com/hudbrog/gCodeViewer/
If you wish to use it locally (i.e. with sources on you local machine) - you will need to add "--allow-file-access-from-files" parameter to chrome(which is unsafe and I DO NOT RECOMMEND it), otherwise it won't work.

nice tool, use it pre-print every time, if at the very least to see how long the print will take (usually spot on with prusa slic3r gcode) also very useful just to double check you're overhangs aren't too optimistic

I've been working with a chromebook for a while, i have to build in tinkercad, slice in astroprint, but never found a great code visualizer like what slic3r or cura would provide, and those would crash with a lot of the drawings i would try. but this is very awesome! thank you so much

Thanks for this amazing tool. I use it all the time to get a "second opinion" on the gcode that slic3r and cura produce. It's great to check the buildtime and to see if the speed limits I set were actually calculated as expected. Thanks!

This works for me. I bought some files to make an airplane, and they prepared GCode for this in addition to the stl files, factory files, they did a great job. So I printed the first GCode file and I had problems. So I had to use their stl files and rotate, split, etc to work best for me.

But I didn't want to do this with every file they provided,because the probably did a good job with all their other files, so I wanted to predict whether they will print first.

Thanks, I appreciate the chance to see what I am about to print first, a reasonable desire which you have fulfilled!

Really nice. Would love to see an option to have a "side view" (similar to 3D, but maybe simpler) just to show progress as the model builds. I tend to use this to "follow along" as the GCode is being printed, assuming I don't have the STL file.

Been loving your website. I use it to diagnose gcode slicing errors in my model. Can you add a firmware limitation to speed in the settings so timing is more accurate per machine?
kWr, $/GBP/YEN etc per MM/model would be cool too.
Great work!

None of the other tools I have found so far are able to visualize the gcode files onther than one layer at a time, so I was delighted to find this one -- a slicing problem I first saw after wasting an hour and lots of filament would have been completely obvious when examining the 3D view in GCode Analyzer.
Thank you for creating this, it is going right into the toolbox! :-)

Just wanted to say thank you for writing this software/website. It's used daily by me to check my g-code. Sometimes it's just cool to show it too. Friends think it's neat to be able to visualize the tool paths.

This is a great tool to help me when I'm debugging a design -- I can validate that the gcode is going to print the object correctly (or not), saving me from starting the print and discovering problems then...

That is SERIOUSLYAWESOME! Really, I can't help, any time I slice something, coming here and checking how it will be printed... Really, great work and huge thanks!

One thing that I'm noticing is, if I use G0 (the command for the rapid movements: http://reprap.org/wiki/G-code#G0:_Rapid_move)http://reprap.org/wiki/G-code#... for retractions, it looks like they're not showed (and I'm talking about both the red dot of the retraction and the green line of the subsequent travel move). Is that something known? Is there a plan to support it? I surely can provide some screenshots, g-code samples, or whatever you think it could be of help.

One technical difficulty though: it appears the website you are hosting it on is a bit unreliable. Sometimes it loads right away, sometimes it takes a couple minutes to load, and sometimes I get a connection timeout error. Any ideas why?

BTW the offline version works without changing "dangerous" settings in the latest version of Opera.

Hi, thanks! Basically, whole application is a static page, after you load it once - it should be stored in your browser cache for quite a long time. I've signed up for a monitoring service to check latency from different parts of the world. If it shows significant problems - I'll move it to another hosting.

This looks fantastic!!! Is there a way to start up this viewer with a named gcode file from the command-line rather than needing user interaction? (I currently have tatlin being invoked automatically by slic3r and skeinforge when they finish slicing to review what they've done, but wouldn't mind swapping to yours.)

Hey, thanks. I was looking into changing 3d representation to be more repetier host like, but every solution I came up with was either time or memory intensive, most of the time - both. Maybe I'll look some more into it, but I'm not very enthusastic about 3d view since I don't see much use for it.

You know, the only reason I even use the 3d view in Pleasant 3d is to look at how the layers overlap, i.e. how much does the current layer of a curved surface(overhang) overlap with the previous layer or the next.

Could you possibly just add a toggle for ghosting an N range of previous and next layers within the 2d view? This would be super useful for checking overlap. Sometimes if I'm really concerned, I'll screen cap a few 2d views in pleasant 3d, and overlay them in photoshop at 30% opacity. I havent seen a gcode viewer that offers this functionality. It would be useful for this user! :)

Hey! Finally got to work on it for a little, so implemented that function. To enable - check the lower option in "2d render options" menu. I prefer to check two lower ones. Current layer is black, higher level is magenta (and yeah, they are actually rendered first the higher one, then the lower one, so visually it lloks like black is on top of pink, but it's the other way around).

I found a small problem though. For some models the viewer will drop either part of the topmost layer, or a few layers from the top. I know the gcode is ok because other visualizers show the whole model, and it prints completely.

Otherwise, this is a great tool and extremely useful for tweaking settings.

Hi Hudbrog
Not sure what I'm not doing right here but I cannot get your app to view the different layers. I'm using version 17 of firefox, and in 2D viewÂ pressing up and down arrow, also page up and page down. The scoll bar on the bottom works but not the up and down scroll bar. hmm not sure what I'm missing here. Also tried chrome version 23, same thing.

One feature request: any chance you could add either the ability to zoom in on a model or define how large our build platforms are? The Makerbot Cupcake's/TOM's are a 100mm x 100mm build platform whereas many repraps are 200mm x 200mm.

I tried this with a 20mm box and it worked great. Every file I've given it since has gotten to 100% and then showed nothing (except the Gcode file itself). The view and info are all blank. I'm using Firefox. Am I missing something?

That might be a known bug, you need to reload page every time you view new file. I'm planning on fixing it pretty soon. If it doesn't help I'd appreciate if you could share the files you are trying to view and OS/browser versions.

This is a really nice tool! Should really help tracking down obscure slicing problems.

Minor point: Are color mappings off a little? In my "Layer info" box, two move speeds are listed, but both have the same color (green). "Retract speed" has a red code, but a dark blue dot is shown on the rendering. These are minor and the tool is totally usable as is. Just thought you might like to know about it.

Thanks. I guess I need to write some kind of documentation to avoid confusion )
Moves are always green, no matter how many speeds there are. Â Just so you can always visually see which lines are moves and which are extrusion without checking layerinfo box. Â
With retractions there are two types of dots - retracts and restarts. Retracts are red, restarts are blue. I only show red on the speed list thou, I can add blue dot there too ) I guess I should remove red color from the list of possible extrusion line colors..

For some reason I don't see my previous answer, so I'll reply again. It does work on any OS (I am using it on macos), but requires a modern version of chrome of firefox browser. It is a web application, so all you need to do to use it - is go to the link I've provided in description and drag your gcode to the designated area.

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